Return to search

Numerical simulations of thedecomposition of a greenpropellant

Concerns about the use of certain chemical species within the aerospace field are growing in recent years. A European regulation, REACh, now makes the use of hydrazine uncertain in – among others- attitude control thrusters. Green monopropellants, which are alternatives for this species already exist, but they all require a catalyst to react. Catalysts constitute the limiting factor for the lifespan of satellites because of the number of thermal cycles they endure. A joint project between ONERA, the French aerospace research center and CNES, the French space agency, was born to develop a high-performance green monopropellant thruster operating without any catalyst. Sizing the thruster and particularly its combustion chamber is not an easy task because of the explosive properties and the lack of knowledge regarding the monopropellant reaction process. The thesis aims at simulating the flow in a combustion chamber using CNES05, a new promising green monopropellant. This monopropellant has a very low vapor pressure and is an energetic liquid. As such, its reaction above a certain temperature -which is called decompositionis not well understood and must be observed closely. For this matter, a test bench was created, and it paved the way for the development of a specific model of decomposition. Indeed, even if the CNES05 decomposition cannot be modeled with the classical theory of isolated droplets, the setup showed us the order of magnitude of the reaction kinetics and the presence of a break up phenomenon. Using this model, the simulations of the flow inside the combustion chamber give us the heat flux profile through its walls, a sizing parameter for the thruster. Large recirculation zones are observed and the influence of the angle of injection seems to be the major injection parameter of influence. The sensitivity of the parameters used in the model is also studied.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:kth-250021
Date January 2018
CreatorsLouis, Neven
PublisherKTH, Mekanik
Source SetsDiVA Archive at Upsalla University
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeStudent thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text
Formatapplication/pdf
Rightsinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
RelationTRITA-SCI-GRU 2018:417

Page generated in 0.0019 seconds